Corner Infield Conundrum

Obviously this team has more issues now than it had a week ago. This all but shatters any realistic hopes to stay in the hunt, although I'd like to retain some level of optimism until after I see what happens with Detroit this weekend.

Thankfully, the most logical options for this team to stay competitive also happen to be the same as if we were preparing for next year. How? Good question, glad I asked. Other than Justin Huber, who is already with the team and seems to be battling some lingering health issue himself, two of our top performers in Rochester happen to be corner infielders:

Danny Valencia, 3B

.286/.305/.454, 7HR, 41 RBI (71 games, 282 plate appearances in AAA)

Danny Valencia, the man that almost every blogger I read has been pining to see get some starts, and, I'm included. His offensive numbers are solid, although they dropped off slightly at the end of the season. He's the man that many are already pegging to have the edge at 3B next year as we move into Target Field. The biggest concern I foresee at the moment is his glove, and that could be what's holding him back (besides not currently being on the 40-man roster). During his stint at Rochester, he's committed 12 errors at third base and posted a .927 fielding percentage. Compare that to Crede (.983), Buscher (.979), and Harris (.950) when they start at 3B. In fact, the league average is .958, so it's quite a drop off to .927 -- although that is comparable to what Bobby Crosby and Mark DeRosa have posted there this year. I'd love to see Valencia get some reps nonetheless, as he'll at least be exciting to watch and should bring a solid bat. But I'm worried about seeing him on the field turf right now, and if he comes up and makes some big errors I can only imagine what Gardy's backlash would be. So if bad defense on turf that he won't be seeing next year gets him in Gardy's doghouse, is it worth a call-up?

Brock Peterson, 1B

.304/.376/.468, 10HR, 43RBI (99 games and 356 plate appearances)

Brock Peterson has put in his time in the minors. It's about to the point where the Twins need to figure out if he can contribute at a major league level, and the season he had at Rochester should have warranted a spot on our bench at least in my opinion. His minor league fielding percentage stands at .994 as he committed 4 errors in his starts at 1B in Rochester. And, if it translates, the league average for 1B in the majors is also .994 (Kendry Morales and Miguel Cabrera's defense is good for league average at 1B). With Morneau and Huber not available, Peterson should be a much better fit than Cuddyer at 1B, who posts an ugly .964, well below league average. I'm not a baseball manager or executive, obviously, but with his numbers and the open spot I can't see why he's not already on a plane to Minnesota.

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Calling up these two would allow us to keep our outfielders in the outfield (where they belong), keep Harris, Tolbert, Buscher, and Casilla available off the bench, and potentially even give Morales some DH opportunities if they arise. If Huber's injury goes away, both he and Peterson should compete for the 1B spot and the other would be a nice option off the bench in a critical situation as they both are great bats.

Obviously there could be some growing pains, but I highly doubt they'll be much worse than trying to shove Cuddyer into the lineup at 1B every day and having to watch Delmon Young bumble around in left every night. When the lineup we see everyday looks like this, I can't help but wonder how we're going to score runs:

Span, RF

Cabrera, SS

Mauer, C

Kubel, DH

Cuddyer, 1B

Young, LF

Harris/Buscher, 3B

Gomez, CF

Punto/Casilla, 2B

Adding these two players would allow slightly more offense while not shifting people from their best positions:

Span, LF

Cabrera, SS

Mauer, C

Kubel, DH

Cuddyer, RF

Peterson, 1B

Valencia, 3B

Gomez, CF

Punto/Casilla, 2B

And good bats like Harris, Morales, Huber and even Young would all be available in critical situations.

Bring on the Dirty Laundry!

*Due to the increased importance of this series with the Chicago White Sox, my desire to say goodbye to the Metrodome during a meaningful series, and the lovely convergence of the Minnesota State Fair, I will be returning to Minnesota for Tuesday and Wednesday's games against the White Sox! Let me know if you're going to the game and make sure to say hi! I'm going to bring my lucky Rick Aguilera jersey and sit right down by the field close enough to trash talk Gordon Beckham and try to get inside his head. Let's go Twins!

Leaving for Atlantic City and returning to NYC in the middle of a game in time to watch the Twins have one of their signature Dome rallies in the 8th inning was the perfect way to spend a weekend! We played at the Taj Mahal and The Tropicana this weekend and had a great time. My poker buddies and I didn't win as much as we should have due to some bad beats, but we didn't lose money, which is the key. Similar to the Twins' season thus far, no? They haven't really made the big runs they should have been capable of with the talent of guys like Mauer and Morneau, but here we are going into September and postseason is in the air alongside Minnesota State Fair cheese curds!

Going into this season, I was eyeing this upcoming White Sox series at the Dome, its convergence with the State Fair, and already planning coming back for my last hurrah at our stadium, and I simply prayed that at the very least these games would be meaningful. With the Twins and Sox separated in the standings by only 1 1/2 games and the Twins only 4 1/2 back from the Tigers (who are about to play the suddenly decent Cleveland Indians), we are in great shape. And we could be in even better shape soon!

If the Twins are serious about acquiring Harden, I'm all for it. Penny would be a decent boost to our struggling rotation, but Harden could be the golden ticket. Before being traded from his career in Oakland over to the Cubs last year, Harden has been plagued by an injury history that would make even Michael Cuddyer groan. He holds a career 3.36 ERA and 1.22 WHIP and average just over a strikeout per inning. Plus he's on my fantasy roster already and it would give me one more reason to cheer for him.

If the Twins can sign him to an extension (preferably incentive-laden), that also just might give Mauer the whiff of looming success that he's been hoping for before re-upping.

I must also say that I'm very happy after watching Jon Rauch pitch, and from what I hear, Mahay didn't do awfully himself. At the least, they have adequately replaced Humber and Gabino -- now we just need to see a fresh face in place of Keppel. And speaking of Keppel, I'm not quite ready to give ultimate confidence to Rauch and Mahay just yet, because hopefully we all remember how dominant Keppel looked in his first few starts until his career stats began to catch up with him. But I'm willing to applaud Rauch and Mahay for their performances, and I'll definitely be rooting for them to keep up that level of success and make the Twins look brilliant in their waiver wire maneuvering.

SEPTEMBER CALL-UPS

Things have already been written about the September Call-ups, and I don't mean to add anything that hasn't already been said. But I will say that it looks as if by all means the Twins front office hasn't given up on this season, and judging by Gardy's words and the Twins' place in the standing we're going to have to wait to see some of our long-anticipated prospects hoist a bat or toe the rubber in the majors.

Obviously Morales was going to come up, I don't think anyone didn't see that coming. But the real question was whether the front office would keep the party line and bring back Buscher, Tolbert, Swarzak and Dickey, or whether we'd see some of our better prospects (who might not be as refined yet), like Valencia, Tolleson, Plouffe, Hughes, Huber, Slama, and Delaney. At least Gardy stated that he wanted to see Valencia up but he's being told that "it's not the time". I just wonder who exactly is telling him that! Gardy is the manager!

I still wouldn't be surprised if someone like David Winfree or Brock Peterson makes a surprise cameo in September, as soon its going to be time to cut bait on them and we might as well add some extra bats to our bench for the stretch run and get a look at them up here. Although the real question is who would we remove to add them to our 40-man now that we know Tolbert and Buscher are coming up. Perhaps Dickey? The real surprising thing is that Tolleson and Hughes haven't been announced as coming up as they're already on the 40-man roster and could provide some valuable bench bats -- and Tolleson has versatility in the infield and outfield just as Tolbert does.

In another somewhat overlooked move, Yohan Pino was traded to the Indians to complete the Carl Pavano acquisition. This could actually come back to haunt us as he's been on fire lately, and despite falling out of the picture the last few years he once was a very promising prospect. Chances are he would have been taken in the Rule 5 draft this year anyway, as there are many prospects to add to our 40-man roster this offseason and not enough spots for all those deserving. I wish him luck, but it's going to be tough to like Pino if he comes back and makes us look foolish!

Ok, hopefully I have some good news tomorrow to write in regards to Harden (or Penny if Harden doesn't work out). But in the meantime, check some of the great blogs on the left for some more Twins news!

Wingin' It in Rochester

The Twins have been playing better baseball of late, but I haven't been there to see it. Instead, I was getting my first glimpse of Twins AAA baseball at the beautiful Frontier Field in Rochester, NY.

Coming with me was my friend Dan (from here on known as Boston Dan):

A graduate of University of Rochester, Dan cheered for the Red Wings during the Cuddyer/Morneau era and still cheers for the local AAA affiliate of the Twins. He's actually one of the few east coast fans I know with some respect for our team -- so he's OK in my book.

We left Manhattan early Saturday morning to pick up our Kia rental at Newark Airport, and after a long drive discussing the minutae of Boston and Minnesota sports, we finally arrived in Rochester around 1 in time to stop by Dan's college hang-out, The Distillery, which I highly recommend if you're in the area.

Because of these delicious Buffalo wings (note the proximity of Rochester, NY to Buffalo, NY).

And this delicious Ithaca Apricot Wheat Beer. 

Which was the perfect blend of apricot flavor with a wheat beer. Much better than the other stuff Dan made me try while we were there.

We stayed at the Hyatt Regency in downtown Rochester, which had a great view of Frontier Field out our window 

and was right by the Genesee River. Unfortunately, our hotel was overrun by a very odd group of people -- I felt like I was walking through the set of Little Miss Sunshine.

We left our car at the hotel and wandered over to Frontier Field to purchase some tickets. FYI, seats right next to the field (a.k.a. "Premium Seats") are only $10. Tickets in the tiers behind home plate at the new Yankee Stadium run around $100. And the atmosphere and festivities (and food) at Frontier Field was much better than it was at Yankee Stadium. Dan and I both came to the conclusion that if we lived here we'd be season ticket owners.

(The view from our $10 seats)

We had some time to kill so we wandered around down to the nearby falls, saw the Genny Light brewery, picked up some cigars for later at a cigar lounge (where we also watched some of the Red Sox shellacking the Yankees), and then headed back to Frontier Field. When we got back we noticed that there was a special exhibit set up outside the stadium commemorating minor league baseball and it included a little showcase of Kirby Puckett, which obviously made me almost well up:

After checking out the exhibit, we made our way into the stadium and wandered around, and let me just say -- Rochester sure knows how to make a beautiful field. Maybe I was just happy to be out of the concrete jungle of Manhattan and about to see my hometown's minor leaguers play outdoors on a beautiful weekend day, but really, Minnesota is going to love outdoor baseball.

The stadium isn't extremely large. The capacity looked somewhat similar to Hammond down in Ft. Meyers, except the construction and amenities were much nicer. Also, as opposed to $11 beers at Yankee stadium, you could get a delicious, large, micro-brew for $6.

And it was good. Similar to the Leine's Sunset Wheat.

We explored the stadium and the gift shop for awhile longer before we finally took our seats to watch some of the pregame festivities:

(Look in the center, in the white get-up. Oh yes, that's Elvis. And he rode around the field in a white Caddy convertible waving to everyone.)

(Apparently the Geico Gecko is a Red Wings fan.)

(This is Mittsy, she is the female mascot for the Red Wings. Spikes was cool, but he had nothing on Mittsy's dance moves. She could groove.)

Things not pictured? How about Bill Buckner signing autographs for free at an autograph stand? (Boston Dan loved that Buckner was there.) Or maybe the Chinese Lion Dance group with the ceremonial drum parading through the concourses and then onto the field. Oh, wait, and then there's The Famous San Diego Chicken. He was amazing.

The Famous Chicken took over mascot duties for the game and provided some very entertaining spectacles between innings, including arguing with the home plate ump and pulling out an eye chart, trying to distract the pitcher in a critical at bat with a poster of a pin-up girl, getting in a water-balloon fight with the entire dugout of the visiting Norfolk Tides, and much much more.

(The Chicken arguing with the home plate ump.)

(The Chicken hexing the pitcher of the Norfolk Tides during his wind-up.)

And those were just the non-baseball highlights.

-Kevin Mulvey pitched a beautiful 7 innings on 112 pitches while only giving up 2 earned runs. He worked himself out of one or two minor jams, but never seemed to lose composure on the mound.

-Danny Valencia had mixed results in the field. He made a very quick throw on a slow dribbler in time to get the runner in the first inning. Then he had a great stab in the 2nd. In the third, however, he missed a seemingly easy line-drive off his glove eliciting groans from the fans (that run ended up scoring). Later he bobbled an easy grounder leading to another runner. He made up for all this by lacing a huge double down the third base line in the 9th for what was eventually the game winning rally.

-Plouffe made a very agile stab and quick turn for a double play in the 2nd which ended a Norfolk rally.

-Huber can rake. He hit a sharp comeback on a rope in the 3rd which took a nasty sharp deflection off the pitcher's mound straight to the third baseman and robbed himself of a hit in the consequence!

-Dustin Martin made a beautiful catch in the outfield to lead off the 8th and followed it up in the 9th with a solid 2 RBI single right through the gap between 2nd and 3rd in the exciting 9th inning rally.

-Morales had a pinch hit appearance with a base-hit in the 9th inning rally.

-Tolbert was the hero, with an amazing diving catch where he splayed out on the ground in left field to rob a sure extra-base hit in the 6th. He was then the first to bat in the bottom of the inning and led off with the Red Wings' first run of the game with a solo blast down the left field line. He also had the game winning walk-off hit with a single to the warning track.

-Henn looked untouchable with two K's in a perfect 8th.

-Delaney got hit around, though his defense didn't help him with Tolleson playing out of position in RF making a few mistakes, but he didn't look horribly dominant, sadly.

But the Red Wings won in walk-off fashion and it was pandemonium at Frontier Field. Even Boston Dan was ecstatic. The evening was capped off by fireworks, but we rushed back to the hotel to change in time for some Dinosaur BBQ.

If you've never had Dinosaur BBQ, you're missing out. There are 3 locations (Syracuse, which is the original, along with Rochester, and Harlem). If you are ever near one of those areas, you should do yourself a favor and eat the best BBQ you'll ever find.

Dinner was followed up by a jaunt down to Rochester's "nightlife" area, which we quickly abandoned after we found out there essentially was no nightlife, and we took advantage of our cigars on a pleasant walk home.

A quick lunch of more Buffalo chicken set us up on Sunday to enjoy a day game. We got to Frontier Field as soon as the gates opened, but a number of people were already lined up for Bill Buckner autograph day. Instead of Buckner, I had more important people I wanted to see:

(Reid Santos and Jose Morales working out with Bobby Cuellar.)

(Jose Lugo talking to a grounds crew member.)

(Slama & Delaney conferring near the bullpen.)

(Matt Tolbert looking skeptical as I congratulate him for his good game Saturday.)

(Huber signing an autograph for a fan.)

(Buscher and Tolbert standing around during pregame warm-ups.)

And when warm-ups were over, I managed to catch the three people I was there for to add to my shelf of autographed Twins baseballs.

(Delaney signed a ball for me on his way out to the bullpen. Dan took over camera duties.)

(Slama signed the ball with Delaney, and I asked if they were excited about probably being on the roster for Target Field's opening season. They just laughed.)

(Valencia blinked in our picture after signing a ball for me. Oh well.)

I felt pretty content with that haul -- 3 future big leaguers with a bright future. Dan and I settled in to watch the game, and this time we were sitting a few rows above the Red Wings dugout along 1st base. Amazing seats. Some notes:

-Huber and Morales both had sharp base hits in the 1st, but the rally didn't go anywhere. Morales looks as solid as ever and I can't wait for him to take over the back-up catcher and pinch-hitting duties for the Twins:

(Morales at bat.)

-Tolleson was back at 2nd after the night game in RF. He had a nice pick in the top of the 2nd inning. He also got thrown out on a great throw by the Norfolk catcher when he tried to steal second base in the 4th inning:

(Tolleson on deck.)

-Dustin Martin had a mammoth homerun in the 2nd, followed immediately by Brock Peterson. The Twins never looked back after that. Martin just barely missed another homerun and settled for a triple in the bottom of the 6th. Macri followed that with an RBI double down the third base line to scored Martin from 3rd base.

(Martin and Tolleson wait between innings.)

-Tolbert again flashed his bat with a bases clearing triple in the 4th to continue an impressive series.

-The Red Wings pitching continued to impress! Reid Santos pitched 6 incredibly strong innings, showing lots of poise on the mound, and he only gave up one run.

(Santos on the mound.)

-Henn gave up a double but no runs as he pitched the 7th.

-Delaney looked like hittable again. He gave up a couple hits and couldn't finish out the 8th, so they brought Slama in early.

(Delaney in the 8th.)

-Slama gave up an inherited runner in the 8th before finishing with a slow roller back to the mound in the next at bat. In the 9th, he struck out a Norfolk player with a particularly nasty offspeed pitch and made the Norfolk batter just look silly.

(Slama, nasty.)

All in all, the games were great. It was amazing to see the beautiful stadium and enjoy a game so inexpensively with such great seats. Congratulations to Rochester on quickly become one of my favorite places to see a game -- that is -- until this, I'm sure.

That's about it for our trip. We got back in late thanks to horrible traffic, otherwise this post would've been up earlier.

And, how about that game against the Orioles Monday night? That brings the winning streak to 4 -- which is actually starting to look like a streak. One thing I noticed during the game, which really has nothing to do with anything, but isn't there a striking similarity between Orioles manager Dave Trembley and William Shatner?